Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/806571
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 2 APRIL 2017 42 Information Technology Over the past 15 years MITA has worked to- wards facilitating the eGovernment pro- gramme. This work has served citizens and businesses alike, facilitating and allowing easy access to government services anytime – accessible online 24x7. Government's vi- sion of allowing access to its services 24x7 would not have been complete without al- lowing such eServices to evolve and thus facilitating and allowing access to these services from anywhere – thus introducing more mobility in services being rendered. During the early months of last year, the Of- fice of the Principal Permanent Secretary in the Prime Minister's Office, supported by MITA, had issued a green paper with the aim to drive forward a number of consultation sessions, with the public and private sec- tors, prior to the compilation and publishing of a mobile government strategy. Following these discussions, the Mobile Government Strategy was launched in November 2016. The strategy paved the way for Government's public service renewal vision – that of facili- tating and enabling access to public services 24x7 from anywhere. The published strategy also served to further the implementation of the already established Public Service Re- newal Programme, being driven by the Office of the Principal Permanent Secretary. Following the launch of the strategy, MITA has worked hand in hand with the various government CIOs as well as the private sec- tor to engage in discussions and immediately initiated work specifically targeting the apps identified for launch towards end of March 2017. Complementing the strategy, an addi- tional two guideline documents have been published - a technical guidelines document and a style guide document. The aim behind these publications was to further facilitate and accelerate take up of the mobile app initiatives. The technical guide focused on the technology aspects of developing mobile applications as well as outlined a number of considerations from a technology perspec- tive. On the other hand, the style guide provided details of how government mobile applica- tions should look, hence addressing the aesthetics and look and feel – thus ensuring conformity as well as a common government branding across government mobile apps and other government eservices offered through other channels such as government websites. Taking a closer look at the strategy, it is spread over a period of two years and identi- fies three phases. The initial phase launched to the public last week relates to mCommu- nications. The first wave of apps focuses on extending and complementing the existing communication channels in the exchange of information between Government and citizens. Some of the apps launched during this first phase also provide a means through which citizens can provide feedback to the respective service owner. These published apps target a variety of government services, including amongst others taxation, customs, health as well as environmental services. Looking at the first wave of released apps, Government has positioned itself, in collabo- ration with public and private sector, to tap on the advances in technology to transform and achieve higher levels of excellence in the provision of services, particularly aimed at reducing bureaucracy as well as promot- ing public services anywhere and anytime. In order to ensure that citizens would have easy access to all government published mservices, the Government, in collaboration with MITA, has developed 'maltapps'. 'mal- tapps' is a mobile app which is downloadable from app stores for the prevalent platforms. The app provides visibility and easy access to all official Malta Government published mServices. In essence, the app represents Government's mservices store. It lists all published mServices, classifying them un- Mobile Government – A milestone in MALCOLM MIZZI MITA Enterprise Architect on Mobile App Initiatives MITA's Executive Chairman Tony Sultana at the launch of 'maltapps'